A New Argument for the Multiplicity of the Good-for Relation

Introduction

Philosophers working in the field of human well-being are primarily interested in explaining what it is for something to be intrinsically valuable to a human life, or what it is for something to make the life of a human being go better. The value that the philosophers are interested in examining is not value as it exists in isolation, but value as it relates to some subject; they want to know not simply what things are good, but what things are good for us. The main competitors in this field are relatively well known. Some philosophers contend that pleasure is the only thing that is intrinsically good for human beings, while others prefer some version of a desire-satisfaction account of well-being, and still others defend an objective-list account. Each of the theories provides a different analysis of what it is for something to count as good for a human being.

Human beings, though, are not the only subjects of good-for claims. For example, we should all agree that a healthy ...